So I know I'm not the only dog-owner on Mookychick, not by a long shot, but I was wondering how many Mooks are interested in dog training?

I have a three and a half year old Aussie named Chase that I originally got with the whole goal of doing agility and competitive obedience. Since I'm in the US, I follow a lot of the standards set by the AKC.

Three and a half years later, and Chase and I have not yet passed our first Rally-O competition. We almost passed the CGC and the Therapy Dog International Test all in one shot, but you need to pass every single item to become certified and we failed one very crucial part: calmly walk past another dog.

Chase loves other dogs. We do not see other dogs unless we're at the dog park. So when the time came to calmly walk past a golden retriever named Prince, Chase looked at Prince, Prince looked at Chase, and it was that scene where two lovers run to each other in a field of flowers.

I can't be mad about it because we were there to have fun and that's exactly what he did, but passing would have meant being able to bring him to work for kid's programs.

So tell me, mooks: Do you train your dogs? Trick training? Obedience? Agility? Do you compete? What kind of pup do you have? Do you have any photos of you and your companion working?

I tried to train my dog but she failed her final test because a spider distracted her. The 11 other dogs were sitting and mine was barking and jumping around like crazy around the damn spider. Since I'm really scared of spiders, I was kind of jumping around too... Mr. Grumpy was laughing, some dogs owners were pissed and the instructor told me to forget about training my dog.

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''Just when I discovered the meaning of life, they changed it.'' George Carlin

Aww Wyno! I'm sorry to hear that your instructor was so negative about that! There are things that happen in the environment all the time that can distract dogs--and us. It surprises me that she was so dismissive--it's not like you trained your dog using spiders the entire week!

Part of how I keep Chase occupied during the week is to just randomly have him do his commands for me. Sometimes he knows (we almost always do a few things when I go out to get the mail, so he is patiently sitting right at my feet when he hears the mailman) but it's fun from time to time.

I'd like to get him to carry grocery bags inside for me. Unfortunately, he doesn't like the sound of plastic bags in his teeth, and I don't like how wet and slobbery he get my canvas bags when he tries to pick them up. but we shall prevail!

I've been training my dog to do tricks recently, and she's a pretty quick learner. In a couple weeks she's learned sit, lie down, roll over, paw(shake), to jump up on command and I've used this to teach her down as well, so if she jumps up excitedly it's much easier to control. However, she's very excitable during training and she REALLY loves the treats I'm using for rewards, so I've started having to take breaks to calm her down because she'll start jumping and trying to steal the tricks out my hand or pocket.

I doubt I'd ever teach her to carry anything for me because she's a husky and tends to bite down and also drools all over anything in her mouth, so anything she picks up will end up being damaged. Maybe if she was a retriever.

omg Indiana that's great~ I'm so happy to hear about your success! I feel you with the treat situation; sometimes I have to take breaks, too, because Chase will just start doing a bunch of things in a random order and not pay attention because he's so fixated on the treats. I like when he's too busy watching the treats when I ask him to do something and he walkts into the door x__x

oh gosh yeah the drool x__x i'm starting to wonder if I should give up on the bag retrieval, but it would be so incredibly practical. i've taken a back seat with the dog training since i'm only home on the weekends and it's bumming me out. I thought we'd be further in the training but i have to rework with him every weekend sincemy parents are letting him get way with some behaviors i wouldn't accept